this year's concession to jazz at the mercurys

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

the roller trio

This year’s jazz contenders met at Leeds College of Music and won acclaim for the raucous funk-infused sounds of their self-released debut. Roller Trio are James Mainwaring (tenor sax and electronics), Luke Wynter (guitar) and Luke Reddin-Williams (drums).
indie

[Serial_Apologist]

the roller trio

More rock than funk, truth to be told. The drums and guitar seem mainly there to backdrop the sax, judging by the 2 other clips I've watched - both around 7 minutes' duration - but that's OK cos the sax player's good, and the backing structures interesting, deploying rhythmically interlocking motivic ideas in the more complex number, and making nice sequential contrasts between raucous and pastoral. Sax and guitar make use of digital pedals to "fix" accompanments, feed in, and add texture or echo, as seen on Calum's link. If that is the promo for the award it wouldn't surprise me - short, nothing much happening, simple 4/4 with backbeat, nar mean? - creates a simplified impression, whereas this...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hVhSBZz2qI

... suggests more content and greater depth.

I don't know whether to wish 'em well or not: how much does a Mercury award actually mean in today's world where the top selling album in any genre last year only sold about 15k copies, we were told this morning?

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

..thatt clip is a rehearsal put up on youtube by the band .... i guess the publicity does them some good eh .... they are not going to win ....unlike the government my money is on Plan B and another national anthem

[Ian Thumwood]

Thanks for posting both clips, Calum.

The Roller Trio were far more interesting than I imagined and it is great that something like this group exists outside London. I don't think that it's too rocky and am not quite convinced it's the usual Mercury "jazz with a rock attitude"kind of solution we can usually expect. The great thing about the Mercury prize is that it sets itself up as an "artistic" alternative to the dross of the Brits but the selections usually seem too esoteric to make any last impression on either myself or even the general public in many instances. Several years ago a mare of mine bought the "Antony & the Johnsons" CD after finding this has won the prize and, without commenting, he loaned it to me to see what I thought knowing that I listen to challenging stuff. The Cd featured a few (obscure) jazz musicians like Doug Wiesselman but this didn't detract from the fact that it was absolute shite. It was "outside" was extremely poor almost to the point of being unlistenable. That aside, good luck to "the Rollers."

With regard to the other clip, I wonder if you took the extremely compelling visuals away it would amount to anything? Rap stirs conflicting emotions with me. I really feel that track like that are a valid social commentary and no less significant that the kind of stuff country blues musicians were producing in the 1920's. Musicially, nothing is happening and it gets irritating particularly quickly. Whilst I think there is a lot of potent social commentary in that track, it doesn't stack up as music. It's strange that someone posted a link to a Youtube clip on a Southampton fans forum last week by a rap artist called "The Beast" who was from Portsmouth and issued a rap called "F*** off, you scummer c***" or words to that effect. The bloke was a total idiot (the video also featured John "Portsmouth FC" Westwood who is held in similar esteem in the red and white half of Hampshire) and was indicative of how effectively a non-musician could produce something so easily which used some modern jazz harmonies and also packed a potent message albeit totally idiotic and unsavory. I doubt in "The beast" knew what he was doing. When you see something like this, it seems to be that the skills of rapping was pretty easily acquired - even by morons. As music, I think rap is a non-starter but there are instances where the words really work just as frequently as there are instances where you would like to thrust a particular sharp and hard engineering brick down their throat. For me, this mirrors alot of country blues where the use of less-than-subtle double entendres gets equally tiring.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

the visuals are integral Ian, he is making/has made a movie as well about the riots and 'Ill Manors' .... in earlier recordings he is a passable soul singer!

[Ian Thumwood]

Calum

I am aware of the film and have read the reviews. My comments were aimed more at the video which is excellently put together and packs a punch in it's honest portrayal of contemporary Britain. However, the "music" falls down on it's own accord without the images. I feel that the Mercury judges are probably selecting this for the social message and the fact that it reflects a large and significant swathe of contemporary society who are generally not allowed a voice - at least in politics. Wonderedif they would have been quite as enthusiastic with "The Beast."

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

Tgraf wants the yanks in the mercs .... mebbe?

did not know this existed never mind 18m hits ....